House of the Rising Sun
by Ms.Orange21
Summary: Future fic. Johnny/Lulu. Johnny's nightmare comes true.


_A/N: This is a future fic – I guess it's also AU-ish since in my story, Johnny wasn't kidnapped before the date. Title taken from a song by The Animals "The House of the Rising Sun." Thank you, Hope, for once again taking the time to beta my story. _

**One-Shot: The House of the Rising Sun**

_**There is a house in New Orleans**_

_**They call the Rising Sun**_

_**And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy**_

_**And God I know I'm one**_

Johnny always hated the Zacchara mansion, mainly because it was like a prison to him. He couldn't leave; he couldn't do anything without being followed. It was dark, morbid, completely depressing and it made him crazy. So he started to stand on ledges and jump off buildings; sneak out in the middle of the night and drive away at 150mph. His favorite, though, was egging people on, trying to get them to shoot him. By the time he was 23, it seemed like death was the only option to get out of that damned house.

But then, during one of his escapes, he found a random girl hitchhiking along the side of the road, and he found something to live for.

* * *

Things finally seemed to be going right in Johnny's life. Logan finally woke up from his coma, with a touch of amnesia that Patrick Drake said should probably only be temporary. It did come out that he wasn't the TMK, but Lulu still decided to press charges for assault and battery and Johnny happily offered to pay all of her attorney fees. Logan was out of the picture, and Claudia was taking over the daily duties of running the Zacchara organization. There was only one thing Johnny needed to make his life complete. And he finally had it. He and Lulu agreed to stop fighting what was between them the night she clocked Logan. They did it slightly ass-backwards by making love first and then going on a date, but Johnny wouldn't have it any other way. That was just the way their relationship was.

_**My mother was a tailor**_

_**She sewed my new blue jeans**_

_**My father was a gamblin' man**_

_**Down in New Orleans**_

_**Now the only thing a gambler needs**_

_**Is a suitcase and trunk**_

_**And the only time he's satisfied**_

_**Is when he's roarin' drunk**_

Anthony had worked long and hard for the Zacchara organization to become what it was. By the time he was 21, he was well on his way to becoming a prolific mobster in California. He got married soon after, to a young woman named Laura. They lived happily for a few years, up until her death in childbirth to what was to be his daughter, Claudia. Laura's death was the start of his long history of mental problems. He became very depressed, erratic, drinking all the time. He started taking wild chances on deals, randomly killing people whose ideas he didn't like. After a year of these actions, Anthony's lawyer, Trevor Lansing, suggested that they move away – far away and start fresh. So Anthony, Claudia and Trevor moved cross-country to New York. There, he fell hopelessly in love with another woman, Maria. She was soothing to him; he became the Anthony of old – before his mind had turned on him. They married, and a year later, out came Johnny. During that year, he built his way up to the top of the New York mob scene. He was so busy, he couldn't tell that Trevor was weaseling his way into his affairs. He would feed Anthony nuggets – things like "Maria loves Johnny more than you," or "Your son is going to be your downfall one day." It began to eat away at his mind. Finally, he snapped, and tried to kill Johnny – only to have Maria jump in front of the bullet instead. That was when Anthony Zacchara became what he is today, and Johnny became a prisoner in his own home.

_**Oh mother tell your children**_

_**Not to do what I have done**_

_**Spend your lives in sin and misery**_

_**In the House of the Rising Sun**_

It was Lulu who made Johnny want a different life. He wanted to be free of what the Zacchara name stood for. He wanted to not worry about having a guard with him 24/7. He wanted to be free to love without consequences. So when Trevor called up his sister to come and help out with the daily business activities, Johnny gracefully stepped back and let her take over.

When he had first started dating Lulu, Lucky and Nicholas were not thrilled with the situation. They did everything they could to try and talk her out of the relationship. Lucky kept trying to find something to charge him with, but with Claudia in charge, Johnny didn't have any hand in what the Zaccharas did. Nicholas was just downright mean to him, calling worthless and dangerous. Saying he would never amount to anything but violence. Yet Johnny did nothing. All he did was accept whatever they threw at him and killed them with kindness. The only person who accepted him, aside from Lulu, was Luke. They had a camaraderie that couldn't be explained, save for Luke saying, "He reminds me of me."

And then the one thing Johnny was always afraid of happened. Lulu got caught in the crossfire. They had been eating dinner on the patio at the Metro Court with Claudia when it occured. It was obvious the sniper was aiming for Claudia, but Lulu stood up and walked around the table at the wrong moment. She got 3 bullets in the back and hit her head on the table on the way down. For the next 3 months, Johnny would have nightmares of that moment replaying over and over and over again.

When they got to the hospital, Johnny was attacked by Nicolas and Lucky. He didn't even fight back; he really didn't want to. Even thought he wasn't in charge anymore, it was his name and his family that caused this to happen to Lulu. This was his fault. He deserved whatever punishment he got. Between Luke and Claudia, they were able to get the brothers off of him with only minimal damage.

As soon as Dr. Scorpio came out with the prognosis, Johnny couldn't breathe. He felt like someone had just punched him in the stomach. Lulu had brain swelling from the hit she took when she fell, a collapsed lung from one bullet and a severe liver laceration from another; the third didn't hit any vital organs. They were able to take care of everything successfully in surgery. That was the good news. The bad news was that she was in a coma and couldn't breathe on her own – and they didn't know how long it would be until she woke up – if she ever woke up.

_**Well, I got one foot on the platform**_

_**The other foot on the train**_

_**I'm goin' back to New Orleans**_

_**To wear that ball and chain**_

It had been 3 months since the shooting. Lulu was still in a coma and on a ventilator. Johnny left the Zacchara mansion only to visit her at the hospital. Actually, it was more like Johnny left the hospital to go home to shower and change. He was by her bedside for what seemed like days on end. He barely ate and he barely slept. He hadn't shaved or gotten a haircut in months. Most of the time he would hang out in the waiting area until visiting hours would start up again or until one of the nurses would force him to go home. Whenever he did go home, all he would do is quickly shower, then sit at the piano until it was time to go back.

Claudia would try to get him to eat whenever she could. She would sit next to him at the piano with a sandwich and some fruit and try to get him to talk about what was going on. But all she would get was the solemn tune of "Claire De Lune". The nurses at General Hospital had called her, concerned for Johnny's well being. "He's lost a lot of weight since the shooting." "Maybe you should look into getting him to talk to a psychiatrist." When Claudia looked at him whenever he left for the hospital, all she saw was a shadow of his former self.

* * *

Johnny stood at the Overlook. After these 3 months, Luke had finally given up hope and signed the paperwork to remove Lulu from the ventilator. She would slowly stop breathing and die. A tear escaped his eye and slowly slid down his cheek. He couldn't go back to living the life he had before Lulu. She was his saving grace, his angel. And if she was going to die, so was he. Life without her would be too painful to deal with. Now, at this exact moment, he understood why his father went mad when Maria died. Loving her was his world, and without her, he was nothing. And he suffered for it, because he didn't have the guts to die with her. But Johnny did. He took the gun out of his pocket. They were going to turn off Lulu's vent at 4:30pm. He would give it an hour – it should only take a few minutes, but sometimes the patient took longer to slip away – and then he would join her by shooting himself in the head.

At 5:25pm, he took the clip out of his gun to make sure it was loaded and ready. At 5:29pm, he put the gun to his head and waited for the alarm on his watch to signal that it was time. He heard the watch beep 60 seconds later, but before he could pull the trigger, he heard a voice yell out, "Johnny, no!"

He whipped around, pointing the gun at the direction of the voice. Lucky was standing behind him, with his hands up. "What do you want," he ground out through clenched teeth.

"You're a very hard man to find. You left your cell phone at the hospital. Spinelli couldn't track you. It was good fortune that the security cameras caught your car on them."

"Why did you stop me? Why do you care whether I live or die?" he asked slowly.

"Because I know you love my sister. And for some godforsaken reason, I know she loves you to," he replied, shaking his head slightly.

"Well, there's nothing left to love. She's dead by now. And I'm not going to go insane like my father did when my mother died. So you've got 10 seconds before you get to watch me blow out my brains. Is that something you really want to see, Detective?"

"I have a message from the doctors," Lucky whispered.

Johnny put his hands up to his eyes to staunch the stream of tears that started to flow down his face. "Is that it? Is she gone," he managed to choke out.

"No," he replied. "She's breathing on her own. They think she might wake up."

_**Well, there is a house in New Orleans**_

_**They call the Rising Sun**_

_**And it's been the ruin of many a poor boy**_

_**And God I know I'm one**_

As Johnny sped back to the hospital, all he kept hearing was Lucky saying "…she might wake up." over and over again. He spent the next 3 days by her bedside, talking to her, singing to her, just touching her hair or her face or her hands. He wanted to badly to play the piano for her, but that was impossible. So instead, he would hum or sing their song.

On the fifth day, he was sitting in the waiting area, counting down the hours until he could go back to Lulu's room. Johnny was shocked, to say the least, when Nicholas and Lucky both sat down next to him – one on each side. Nicholas handed him a cup of coffee and Lucky handed him a sandwich. Johnny looked back and forth to each brother about 3 times. "Am I in the Twilight Zone or something? Are you pod people?"

Nicholas cleared his throat before he answered. "We just wanted to apologize for the way we've been acting. We see how much you truly care for our sister, yet we never gave you the benefit of the doubt. For that, we are sorry."

Johnny looked over to Lucky and sighed. "You told him about the Overlook, didn't you?" Lucky just looked down, effectively answering the question.

"Listen, Johnny. I understand what you're going through. When Emily died, I wanted to die, too. I almost did – I almost let the tumor I had kill me just so I could be with her. But I had a son to think about and family who would miss me. And I know Emily wouldn't want me to give up on them."

"I have nothing left," Johnny sighed.

"I believe your sister would think differetnly," Lucky interjected. "Do you want to leave her with nothing?"

"Don't forget Lulu," Nikolas replied, "She's still alive. She hasn't given up yet. She's a fighter. You shouldn't have given up on her so easily. She wouldn't have given up on you." He put a hand on Johnny's shoulder, then he and Lucky got up to leave.

Nicholas was right. Johnny knew Lulu was a fighter so why did he give up so easily? He should have been in that room with her, wiling her to breathe when the vent was taken off. He was there for her every other moment, why not that one? Heh. Maybe Claudia was right. Maybe love does kill. Or at least it just warps your mind.

Johnny looked at his watch. Visiting hours were about to start again. He collected his sandwich and coffee made his way to Lulu's room. He stood over her bed, looking down on her. She looked the same as always. Golden hair spread out over the pillow, arms folded across her stomach. He pulled the chair next to the bed and lowered the railing on the side he sat on. Then Johnny laid his head on the bed next to her and began to talk.

"I'm sorry, Lulu," he began quietly, "I'm sorry for not believing in you. I'm sorry I almost killed myself without knowing if you were still alive. I'm sorry I'm a Zacchara – doomed to have enemies forever just because of my family. I'm ruined all because of a name. And most of all, I'm sorry that when you wake up, you'll still have to deal with that. Because if I didn't lose you from this, I'm sure as hell not going to give you up now. I'm sorry if that's selfish, but I need you."

"If you think I would let you leave me after all of this," a hoarse voice quietly whispered from the head of the bed, "you're sorely mistaken."

"Lulu?"

"And when I have the energy, we are so talking about this killing yourself thing."

For the millionth time in the past 3 months, Johnny Zacchara cried.


End file.
